WATCH HISTORY
Awatchis a small and a portabletimepiecetypically worn either on the wrist or attached on a chain. Awristwatchis designed to be worn around thewrist, attached by awatch strapor other type ofbracelet, includingmetal bands,leatherstraps or any other kind of bracelet. Apocket watchis designed for a person to carry in apocket. Eventually, the pocket watch became a more coveted fashion than the traditional pendant timepiece. This was probably due to the introduction of waistcoats by Charles II of England. Now that they were in a pocket, the shape of the watch was curved and flattened to prevent the edges from causing damage. The face of the watch also got a glass cover to protect the somewhat delicate hands inside.
Watches in the 13th- 16th Centuries
The oldest mechanical watch is recorded as being from England. There are several ancient clocks that still work, one of which dates back to 1386 and is located in Salisbury Cathedral. There are no faces or hands for this clock, but it can tell you the time by striking the number of hours.
In the 14th century, there were about three mechanical clocks of interest in Italy. One would ring a bell each hour, another was an astronomical clock, and the third one kept track of the sunrise, date, and hours as well. With more progress, blacksmiths started to make clocks with very loud bells. These could be heard across towns and houses.
By the 16th century, clocks were also made using bronze, brass, and silver instead of iron. It was in the 1540s when the Swiss watch industry was officially born. This was actually due to the ban on wearing jewelry, enforced by a reformer named John Calvin. Stripped of their trade, jewelers turned their skills towards watches. These were technically not jewelry but functional accessories, but the talent of the jewelers made them works of art. By 1574, people saw the first pocket watch. This was made of bronze, with religious images on both sides.
Watches in the 17th-19th Centuries
This was the era when pendulum clocks were invented. While Galileo studied the concept in 1602, the first patent for these watches was by Christian Huygens more than 50 years later. With the pendulum, time deviation in clocks was reduced to about 15 seconds from the previous 15 minutes.
By the 17th century, pocket watches had also made a lot of progress. Before this, they were only capable of displaying the current hour. By 1680, minute hands came into being, with the second hand coming about a decade later.
CLOCK WATCH
Clock watch is the first timepieces to be worn, made in the 16th century These 'clock-watches' were fastened to clothing or worn on a chain around the neck. They were heavy drum-shaped cylindrical brass boxes several inches in diameter, engraved and ornamented. They had only anhour hand. The face was not covered with glass, but usually had a hinged brass cover, often decoratively made asjewelryand novelties for thenobility, valued for their fine ornamentation, unusual shape, or intriguing mechanism, and accurate timekeeping was of very minor importance.
POCKET WATCH
Apocket watch is made to be carried in apocket has a healthy lifespan of 500 years before they migrated to wrist watch. Pocket watches generally have an attachedchain to prevent them from being dropped. A pocket watch has certain movements such as the Dial up and Dial down; Pendant up Pendant down; Pendant left and Pendant right movements.
WRIST WATCH
The firstwristwatchwas created in 1812, to fit thewristof the Queen of Naples. However, they had previously been introduced in the 1570s but were described as an armwatch. Wristwatches were primarily worn by women as thewatcheswere prone to damage by the elements, which is why men wore pocketwatches. Wrist watches are the most common type of watches that is being used till date.
SMART WATCH
Asmart watchis awearable computerin the form of awatch which began to go on sale. Modern smart watches provide a localtouch screen that could perform basic tasks, such ascalculations, digital time telling,translations, andgame-playing. It also includes mobile apps, amobile operating systemand WiFi/Bluetooth connectivity. Some smart watches function asportable media players, withFM radioand playback of digital audio and video files via aBluetoothheadset calls.
TheTimex Data link Smart watches realized a wireless data transfer mode to communicate with a PC. Appointments and contacts created withMicrosoft Schedule+, the predecessor of MS Outlook, could be easily transmitted to the watch via a screen blinking light protocol.
- In 2010 Sony Ericsson launches theSony Ericsson Live View, a wearable watch device which is basically an external Bluetooth display for an Android Smartphone.
- As of July 2013, the list of companies that were engaged in smart watch development activities consists ofAcer,Apple,BlackBerry,Foxconn,Google,LG,Microsoft,Qualcomm,Samsung,Sony, VESAG ,Toshiba. HP,HTC,Lenovo, andNokia.
- Asof 4 September 2013, three new smart watches had been launched: theSamsung Galaxy Gear, SonySmart Watch 2,
- On 9 September 2014,Apple Inc.announced its first smart watch calledApple Watchto be released in early 2015.
- On 24 April 2015,Apple Watchbegan shipping across the world On 31 August 2016, Samsung unveiled theSamsung Gear S3smart watch, with a higher specifications, there are at least two models, the Samsung Gear S3 Classic and the LTE version Samsung Gear S3 Frontier
- The top smart watches that debuted at the 2017 Consumer Electronics Show included theCasioWSD-F20,Misfit WearablesVapor and theGarminFenix 5 series.
- Apple released on 22 September 2017 theirApple Watch Series 3model which offers built in LTE cellular connectivity allowing phone calls, messaging and data without relying on a nearby smart phone connection
- In its September 2018 keynote, Apple introduced a redesigned Apple Watch Series 4
- In 2020, the United StatesFood and Drug Administrationgranted marketing approval for an Apple Watch app called Night Ware. The app aims to improve sleep for people suffering fromPTSD-related nightmares, by vibrating when it detects a nightmare in progress based on monitoring heart rate and body movement.
In general, modern watches often display the day, date, month, and year. For mechanical watches, various extra features such as moon-phase are sometimes included. Most electronic quartz watches, on the other hand, include time-related features such astimers,chronographsandalarmfunctions. Furthermore, some smart watches even incorporatecalculators,GPS andBluetoothtechnology or have heart-rate monitoring capabilities, and some of them useradio clocktechnology to regularly correct the time. Wristwatches were worn only by women before the 20th century — and more for decoration than anything as practical as punctuality. The first wristwatch was made by the Swiss watch manufacturer Patek Philippe in 1868, according to Guinness World Records.
People have been wearing watches for many years, and will probably continue to do so in the future. Wearing a watch can be for practical uses as well as fashionable ones. Like all other inventions, watches have a very interesting history from the time they were made all the way to the present day.